First rule of science, any science, is "You do not get to make up the rules as you go along"! Observing is no more and no less a part of astronomy than cosmology or astrophysics and theoretical physics is part of physics even if can be used as an adjunct to different parts of astronomy.

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Any day you wake up on "the right side of the dirt" is a good day.

T. Anderson

hmmmm... I would say that cosmology and astronomy are a lot alike, but if you look at the people whom call themselves "cosmologists" most of them specialize in theorizing e.g Stephen Hawking... Astrophysics may be more in the "observing" busniess, but I think thoretical physics is pretty much self-evident...

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The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool.
~~~ Richard Feynman ~~~
There is no harm in doubt and skepticism, for it is through these that new discoveries are made.
~~~ Richard Feynman ~~~

I am from North Carolina and have been studying physics, robotics, and rocket science for quite a while now.

Hi quicksilver3367, welcome to BAUT

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At night the stars put on a show for free (Carole King)

Welcome to BAUT quicksilver3367 and spratleyj.

I'm 32 living in NYC, and found the board through the Astronomy Today podcasts. What a great place! Just reading this into forum there are so many great people. Can't wait to sink my teeth into some discussions.

I'm not in any kind of science realted field (sales at the moment), just curious about and fascinated with astronomy and all things cosmological. I'm looking forward to learning some great stuff.

Hopefully be talkin' to you soon.

Welcome to BAUT WazzuNYC.

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At night the stars put on a show for free (Carole King)

Hi everyone! I've been a longtime reader of BA, and watched my first live chat this last week. I'm a college sophomore majoring in computer science and physics, and I love astronomy.

Welcome to posting on BAUT Gadren.

I notice that backwards, your screen name is Nerd-ag...

HAHAHAHAHAHA<snort> <snort>

eh....


ok anyway...

Welcome aboard!

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Any day you wake up on "the right side of the dirt" is a good day.

T. Anderson

Welcome to BAUT Garden ..err Gadren.

Originally Posted by mickal555


Hang on, what?

Welcome!

But, where did you pull my name from :P

You beat me by heaps- 5 years these days, I'm an old fogey- but how did you know that? reply, I dont know I gess I just have skills who knows.

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A journey of a thousand miles starts with one step.

Hello everyone,
I'm Jason and a couple years ago I found Bad Astronomy, I forgot about the site until rediscovering it a couple days ago. A little about me, right now I'm a college student after spending 8 1/2 years in the USN.

Welcome to BAUT jasonof2000.

USN - US Navy?

Yes.

Uninhibited Sulfurous Nitrates.

Hello Everyone,

I intro'd myself a few pages back, but in another thread Chris Hillman pointed out that I really ought to have posted a little more info about myself.

The point was well taken, so here's some stuff from my profile:

Background: BS Astrophysics, UMass-Amherst, 1973

Interests: Astronomy, Rare Book Collecting, Genealogy, HO Model Railroading, DVD authoring.

Occupation: got started teaching physical science, electronics, and digital processing lab sections. After that I did some ophthalmic optics design, which evolved quickly into software engineering. 30 years later I went nuts on the job. Here I am: semi-retired insanity manager, small-time landlord of a duplex kingdom, surrounded by toys. All things considered, things could be a lot worse without these toys.

On the rare book collecting: when I have money I focus on first edition Science Fiction by the old masters. I go for the hard stuff, Clarke, early Heinlein, no baloney.

L. Ron Hubbard is banned. Sue me if you don't like it.

Wait! I take that back!

I get other types of rare books if I like them and if money allows.

Genealogy: mostly French-Canadian. In other words the easy stuff that doesn't take a lot of time.

HO Railroading: analog only. May go to DCC later if I can figure out how to get a decent decoder working for the old analog engines. The ones out there now are problematic at low speeds (whining, stuttering, etc. One of me around here is more than enough).

Databases: I use these to catalog my book collections and genealogical data. BookCAT is the preferred book organizer. The Master Genealogist is used for what it says. I used to write this software myself. Now it all looks like spaghetti code that slowly rotates.

Well, here goes: in 1984, some of my earliest software work was done at Perkin-Elmer on the Hubble Space Telescope. I wrote motor drivers for the secondary mirror positioning actuators. They were used to factory-align the secondary mirror with the primary; I doubt they ever made it into the flight guidance system that was used on the mission. Later on I had reason to worry that they had.

After the Hubble was transported to Lockheed I moved on to other outfits. In the meantime the telescope was launched and immediately went belly-up. Some of the early reports suggested that the problems were related to the positioning of the secondary mirror. Prior to this I had a hard time choosing between madness and reason. So much for that episode of indecision.

If someone else wrote the secondary positioning software that was actually used in the mission, I pity that poor petard. He/she knew for certain that the software was on the block. I had only a suspicions paranoia on my side.

I got a reprieve when the spherical aberration of the primary absolved the secondary mirror actuators. Another boost came after the repair mission.

Thus I was able to power-code through Y2K and for a short time beyond. Then the inevitable transition past an event horizon finally occurred. After an interval of some sort, ECT was used to spirit me out of there. It worked, more or less.

An informed word of warning to software engineers who suspect they might be approaching the same boundary: it'll be something you'd never suspect, a simple thing. Even a serial port driver could do it.

One day you'll be about to put the finishing touches on a ring buffer when suddenly you'll find that you can't touch the keyboard. The sensation will be that of pressing on a plate glass window between your fingers and the keys.

You won't see it coming, so forget even trying. The only thing that will work is avoidance. Your imagination can take care of that part.

Good grief,

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Big Al Mintaka

"I believe a leaf of grass
Is no less than the journeywork of the stars"
--Walt Whitman

Welcome, fellow Minuteman!

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Bring back Firefly!

"It is quite clear that Occam's razor does not sharpen in your pyramid." (Nicolas)

"Still, a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest." (Paul Simon)

Hi AlanMintaka. Me too, I model railroad in HO. There are a couple of others around here, as well as assorted other model makers.

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At night the stars put on a show for free (Carole King)

Hi Swift,
Thanks for taking the time to read my long-winded display of false bravado, and good to meet another HO person!

Are you into DCC? If so, are there some decent decoders for analog engines out there somewhere?

I'm way out of touch on this stuff. I'm building a Super Table for my layout and it's taking forever to buy the materials on my budget. I don't think I've researched the decoders in a year or so.

Have a good one,

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Big Al Mintaka

"I believe a leaf of grass
Is no less than the journeywork of the stars"
--Walt Whitman

I go all analog myself.